The rationalizations for Putin’s aggression against a sovereign and peaceful neighbor up to and including concern for the ‘minority’ ethnic Russian speakers of Donbas can easily be compared to Germany post WWI. The odious irony is the claim that the Jewish Zelensky is running a Nazi regime unlike the semi-fascist, newspeak Putin and his band of homophobic kleptocratic oligarchs.
The Putin apologists who have thus far dominated in this comment section with eloquent wormholes of logic and reasoning fail to ask one question of Putin; why doesn’t he also use their learned reasoning to make his case? Instead, he calls his aggression a special military action to liberate his Ukrainian kin from illiberal, non democratic Nazis, (a little projection never hurt anyone, right?) even if liberation means targeted killings of non strategic civilian centers. We will free you with a boot on your head or kill you in the process for your own good in typical Russian/Soviet style.
Of course we should study the myriad cause and effects of what precipitates certain actions but there are also more important transcendental considerations of the human spirit when confronted with what we believe to be right and wrong and willingly risk everything to that end. It’s, after all, the foundational history of America.
It's hard to see how the "What led to..." part can whitewash our role in opposing a Russian-friendly Ukrainian govt some years back. To bury that underneath in a euphemism about revolution seems to purposely miss the point. It may be convenient to simply blame Putin but that's like saying high gas prices are purely his fault, too. It may have an element of truth but it is hardly accurate.
It remains a point of fascination, and some bewilderment, how in an alleged information age in which we're told so many things are nuanced, that this war is reduced to a crude binary. Ukraine may well be the good guy, but Zelensky himself is not. There is no pro-democracy effort afoot when the country benefitting has taken multiple actions that are explicitly anti-democratic.
A great reflection. As Leo Tolstoy put it succinctly, participants in a war can stop the war by stopping to make it. However all involved must ask themselves difficult questions that Nikita posed. What is all of it for in the end?
I add, "Cui bono?" Who benefits? Especially at any of the decision points. I'm still trying to figure out who in particular intended to gain from Maidan. Who gains by installing carefully chosen actors in important posts in the new government? But again, at each juncture, what really are the choices, and who benefits?
1. Only Putin knows for certain why he chose war over other means.
2. See answer 1
3. This could go very wrong. If Putin thinks Russia is losing, there is no guessing what he will do. The world order has already been changed. It will take decades for Russia to rejoin the world community - if ever. Would anyone sign a treaty with Russia again?
4. I hope for pre 2014 borders. Let Ukraine voters work out the problems within their territory. Russia will have to figure out how to repair the damage to its reputation as a country, a supplier and member of the UN. In addition, Russia must reverse its laws limiting debate and discussion.
5. Like you I support humanitarian aid from my own pocket. I also will vote for those who support US providing military and humanitarian aid.
You ask great questions about Ukraine, a place in which I've been interested since I learned, decades ago, that I had great-grandparents from that ethnic-political maelstrom.
My own rule of thumb is to consider Ukraine as Russia's Mexico. Russia too has a "manifest destiny" and a Wild West border (Ukraine itself means "at the frontier.")
Whereas Mexico has Spaniards and Aztecs, Ukraine has East Slavs, West Slavs, Germans, Jews, and Tatars. Big on diversity, not so big on inclusion and equity, if you catch my drift.
It would be a mistake to consider Ukraine an accident waiting to happen, because it's been happening for centuries.
If the US wants Russia to make nice and stay out of Ukraine, they should consider giving Texas back to Mexico and see what happens.
Hey, maybe the Democrats and Joe Biden are already working on that.
As a constitutional conservative (as opposed to a “national conservative “), in some respects I share your philosophical dilemma. Having lived through the entire Cold War, my initial inclination would be unbridled support for Ukraine. But, some 70 years later, global interconnectivity gives me pause. Sometimes jaw, jaw is better than war, war if you mean what you say. It is a conundrum wrapped in an enigma.
"War is 'Hell"" - General William T. Sherman. And Eastern Europe again discovers the fact. Sad. An oversimplistic truth: "It takes TWO to tango." IMHO the conflict is not as "black and white", "good vs. evil" as the media narratives want us to believe. U.S. meddling contributed to the unfolding collective disaster for both Ukraine and Russia. I final bit of country wisdom: "chickens come home to roost."
I think it's pertinent to objectively evaluate the facts at hand.
1. The United States spent nearly five billion dollars in an effort to overthrow Viktor Yanukovych, in 2014, an elected president who just happened to be pro-russian. I presume we can all agree that this form of "power politics" doesn't lead to peace and harmony.
2. Donbass, which overwhelmingly voted for Yanukovych, decided to separate from what they perceive as inernational intereference in their elections, and the corruption in Kiev.
3. The MINSK agreement was then signed by both parties, with the goal of ending a bloody civil war.
4. Almost every independent journalist agrees that Kiev has shelled Donbass, intermittently, for nearly seven years. They refuse to aknowledge any wrong doing, and so the shellings continue, unabated. Someone has to stop it.
5. NATO claims that Russia is conducting a "false flag operation", yet whenever we are asked to provide evidence of such claims, our diplomats stage a "walk-out" which is eerily similar to the actions of the old Soviet Union.
Sending money to a corrupt regime, hell-bent on subjugating the people in Donbass, doesn't sound like a good use of money.
Can anyone imagine what would happen if postmodernists removed Trump from office by force, then pummeled Texas for seven years because they refused to bend a knee? Can anyone imagine 1.5B in arms being provided to Washington, so that they could subjugate the people of Texas.
You either believe in self determination, or you don't. Peace requires compromise. The MINSK agreement was a good start, and Kiev should have abided by that agreement.
In 1932-33, Stalin's regime orchestrated the mass murder of millions of Ukrainians, predominantly by starvation.
I share the fear and loathing of my fellow Eastern Europeans towards what the Soviet Russians did to them between 1945 ending with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. We are all rooting for the success of the Ukrainians. Slava Ukrainii!
Donbass is only asking for autonomy, for the right to deterimine their own laws, to create their own constitution and republic. I believe that denying them these rights is not dismilar to the denial of Ukrainian freedoms during the impositon of the old Soviet Union, which you and I both oppose, and the provocation that led to this current event was predominetly instigated from the west, not from Russia, so I'm afraid I see no logical connection between the thuggery of the old Soviet Union, and Donbass's claim for self determinancy.
Very well summed up. Our news media, for once, (and rather unfortunately in this instance) have united in their condemnation of Russia as the instigator of this war, but as with any conflict, the "why" is important, and our media is blatantly ignoring the provocation that led to the Russian aggression. The US wouldn't have kept quiet and swallowed it if Russia had parked a couple of missiles on the Canadian or Mexican borders, so why would we expect Russia to behave any differently?
There was also something suspect in the manner in which our media came out with what I would normally imagine to be top-secret information about our intelligentsia gathering information about a possible Russian invasion. Both the US and UK media strangely bombarded its public with news of an impending invasion about a couple of weeks prior to the event, almost as if egging Putin to suit action to word. Maybe it's my inner conspiracy theorist working overtime, but I am still not sure of the real reason why the Western Bloc countries anticipated the event with such gusto, publicized it massively, yet apparently took no steps to forestall or prepare for the event, AND the timing seems suspect as well. Is this no more than an instance of deflecting public attention away from our internal crises (inflation, supply chain, The Laptop, etc) before a crucial midterm election, which then snowballed in unanticipated ways? After all, we are no stranger to such callous tactics. Think Clinton's impending impeachment and then inexplicably Operation Desert Storm that same month, Bush's horrendous approval rating and right away troops are sent to Iraq to recover WMDs that existed solely in Bush's imagination, with of course the added bonus of shareholders such as Cheney benefiting from the surge in defence stock prices.
Something smells rotten in the state of Denmark...
The U.S. called out the impending investigation in an attempt to urge preparations for it (both inside and outside Ukraine) and to line up opposition against it. I'm not sure what else you expected/wanted the U.S. to do early this year.
Meanwhile, Operation Desert Storm happened under George (H.W.) Bush (not Clinton) and at the time W. ordered the invasion of Iraq his approval ratings were sky high; it was after 9-11 and the invasion of Afghanistan.
Sure, one reason for that veritable storm of publicity could have been to garner support among other nations, but one can gain support in other ways without letting the world and his dog know about it; Putin ended up getting advance notice and preparing for war, and his preparation seems to have been way better, which our intelligentsia should have anticipated, but didn't. Sanctions have failed, bank freezes have failed, trade embargos have failed, so clearly the support of other nations didn't have the desired effect, and actually even rebounded in some cases.
As for Bush, there have been large sections of the population who have always viewed him as an intellectual zero whose election win was somewhat suspect, and one who lived under the shadow of his father. So his decision could have stemmed from a desire to appear leader-like and prove his naysayers wrong. Another reason put forth by many is that he was obsessed with a personal vendetta against Saddam. That reason makes it even worse. For him to (ab)use the Office of the President for personal revenge, at the cost of so many lives and resources, isn't the act of a leader.
Well, all of this is hearsay and I guess there is no way to definitely know what the reasons were, but it does seem as if our presidents and our political elite are not above using the the army and the excuse of war for personal gain.
So with that said, I must admit I have plenty of doubts about the origins of this latest conflict.
To add to it, it does seem as if our attention is constantly being deflected by major news, only for it to fizzle out like a damp squib in less than a month, until the next big event. This Russia-Ukraine conflict, the monkey pox, the MAL raid, all these news items seem to have gone off the boil though they were huge at the time, and it seems weird. With each major "crisis", since air-time is finite, I have noticed that there is less and less talk about supply chains and inflation and the dreaded laptop.
I just read those links, but I don't see how these articles are relevant to Donbass's claim for self determinancy. Please keep in mind that we started this war, in 2014, by funding the removal of Viktor Yanukovych who fairly won the election. The liberal elite in Kiev were unhappy, and the U.S. didn't like that he was pro-russian AND quite conservative, and so we spent over 5B to remove him by force.
Donbass, of course, who voted for him. refused to accept this meddling in their election because Yankukovych was their guy. He was their choice, and he won fairly, so they made the perfectly rational decision of leaving the union.
The negotiaton for their autonomy was agreed upon by all sides, with the help of Paris outlined in the MINSK protocol. This agreement ended the civil war, and gave Donbass autonomy.
For whatever reason, Kiev did not abide by this agreement. Is it because Donbas is rich in oil? Is it because they hate Russians? I don't know. But 1.5B in arms was sent to Kiev in 2019, and some of those shells (American made) are now sitting on the doorsteps of Donbass residents, and this has been ongoing for seven years. Surely, these people deserve to live without shells landing on their porch.
This is also the equilavent of Russia sending 1.5B in arms to Mexico city, and then intermittently harrassing Tijuana residents (on our border).
Now, if Russia is the one shelling Donbas, and if this is a false flag operation as NATO claims, then WE MUST SHOW EVIDENCE. When Brazil, China, Argentina, Turkery, Hungary and Russia ask for evidence, and our diplomats walk out of the room, then that is eerily similar to the actions of the old USSR. When journalists in the United States ask for evidence, and the only reply is "it's classified and you just have to believe us", then this too is eerily similar to the old USSR.
So this is the provacation that led to war.
Now in regards to the war itself, and children dying and hospitals being bombed, etc, etc. First of all, please keep in mind that the conversation is a mouth piece for the liberal elite. They curate their comment section, and the only academics who write for the conversation are liberal, and quite liberal I might add. Some of them might be described as "hard left". Despite this disclaimer, I fully agree that Russia is a more or less a totatilitarian state. But that has nothing to do with Donbass.
And there is a great deal of propaganda on both sides. For example, one photo showing Zelensky on the "front lines of war", dissimenated by our media, was actually a photo taken in 2019. And the town that was supposedly bombed by Russians, was actually leveled three days prior in an effort to garner support from the international community. In other words, they evacuated the town, bombed it, then when the Russians arrived three days later they sent out a press release claiming so-called war crimes. This type of pyschology is employed on both sides. Indeed, the pentagon has a whole department designed just to send out propaganda. And Russians have similar departments.
I don't agree with the article about Syria, because we also started that war. Obama directed the CIA to overthrow Assad, and we funded and armed the resistance. I think the operation was called Timber Sycamore, but don't quote me.
You may be 100% correct in what you write. Yes, governments are incompetent, hypocrites, lie and break promises including the USA. That said, Ukraine is not about the Donbass and who did what to whom and when any longer. It is about Putin and Putin's (or other want to be or current types like him) world view is my take. I personally don't want to live in a country that is run like Putin runs a country. I think, unfortunately, he needs to be stopped. Perhaps you don't agree with that assessment of the situation.
Yeah, I guess we have to agree to disagree. If Tijuana was being shelled by Mexico City, and Russia was funding Mexico City, I think the United States would be justified in ending the conflict. I am only placing the shoe on the other foot. So I fully support premptive strikes, when a conflict is brewing upon one's borders.
Now if Putin were to take all of Ukraine, then I would disagree with his actions. I would vehemently oppose that type of subjugation. But if he does what he says he's going to do, which is secure the liberty of Donbass, and nothing more, then I believe he is doing the right thing. I wholeheartdely support Donbass's desire for self determination.
Donbass wants liberty, not unlike the men and women who sought to separate themselves from England many years ago.
Thanks for the reply. Yes, it would be nice if everyone, everywhere could have self determination...at least to some reasonable point anyway. They may still get it one day although they may not be happy with a repressive government like Putin's. Then maybe they don't mind that type of government. I sure have no idea what the people in the Donbass are thinking. I figure they are in the thick of a proxy war at this point. The whole thing is a sad situation.
Haim's suffering, which I hope does not include injury, is chosen. The Ukrainian's suffering is unchosen (thrust upon him/her). Haim should not suffer criticism/indignation for the greater act of courage.
The rationalizations for Putin’s aggression against a sovereign and peaceful neighbor up to and including concern for the ‘minority’ ethnic Russian speakers of Donbas can easily be compared to Germany post WWI. The odious irony is the claim that the Jewish Zelensky is running a Nazi regime unlike the semi-fascist, newspeak Putin and his band of homophobic kleptocratic oligarchs.
The Putin apologists who have thus far dominated in this comment section with eloquent wormholes of logic and reasoning fail to ask one question of Putin; why doesn’t he also use their learned reasoning to make his case? Instead, he calls his aggression a special military action to liberate his Ukrainian kin from illiberal, non democratic Nazis, (a little projection never hurt anyone, right?) even if liberation means targeted killings of non strategic civilian centers. We will free you with a boot on your head or kill you in the process for your own good in typical Russian/Soviet style.
Of course we should study the myriad cause and effects of what precipitates certain actions but there are also more important transcendental considerations of the human spirit when confronted with what we believe to be right and wrong and willingly risk everything to that end. It’s, after all, the foundational history of America.
It's hard to see how the "What led to..." part can whitewash our role in opposing a Russian-friendly Ukrainian govt some years back. To bury that underneath in a euphemism about revolution seems to purposely miss the point. It may be convenient to simply blame Putin but that's like saying high gas prices are purely his fault, too. It may have an element of truth but it is hardly accurate.
It remains a point of fascination, and some bewilderment, how in an alleged information age in which we're told so many things are nuanced, that this war is reduced to a crude binary. Ukraine may well be the good guy, but Zelensky himself is not. There is no pro-democracy effort afoot when the country benefitting has taken multiple actions that are explicitly anti-democratic.
A great reflection. As Leo Tolstoy put it succinctly, participants in a war can stop the war by stopping to make it. However all involved must ask themselves difficult questions that Nikita posed. What is all of it for in the end?
The writer asked five excellent questions.
I add, "Cui bono?" Who benefits? Especially at any of the decision points. I'm still trying to figure out who in particular intended to gain from Maidan. Who gains by installing carefully chosen actors in important posts in the new government? But again, at each juncture, what really are the choices, and who benefits?
I am glad Ukraine is fighting back , I just wish there was policy debate rather then elites screaming Putin puppet every time there is a criticism
Thanks for a thought-provoking post.
My answers:
1. Only Putin knows for certain why he chose war over other means.
2. See answer 1
3. This could go very wrong. If Putin thinks Russia is losing, there is no guessing what he will do. The world order has already been changed. It will take decades for Russia to rejoin the world community - if ever. Would anyone sign a treaty with Russia again?
4. I hope for pre 2014 borders. Let Ukraine voters work out the problems within their territory. Russia will have to figure out how to repair the damage to its reputation as a country, a supplier and member of the UN. In addition, Russia must reverse its laws limiting debate and discussion.
5. Like you I support humanitarian aid from my own pocket. I also will vote for those who support US providing military and humanitarian aid.
You ask great questions about Ukraine, a place in which I've been interested since I learned, decades ago, that I had great-grandparents from that ethnic-political maelstrom.
My own rule of thumb is to consider Ukraine as Russia's Mexico. Russia too has a "manifest destiny" and a Wild West border (Ukraine itself means "at the frontier.")
Whereas Mexico has Spaniards and Aztecs, Ukraine has East Slavs, West Slavs, Germans, Jews, and Tatars. Big on diversity, not so big on inclusion and equity, if you catch my drift.
It would be a mistake to consider Ukraine an accident waiting to happen, because it's been happening for centuries.
If the US wants Russia to make nice and stay out of Ukraine, they should consider giving Texas back to Mexico and see what happens.
Hey, maybe the Democrats and Joe Biden are already working on that.
Logic is wanting.
As a constitutional conservative (as opposed to a “national conservative “), in some respects I share your philosophical dilemma. Having lived through the entire Cold War, my initial inclination would be unbridled support for Ukraine. But, some 70 years later, global interconnectivity gives me pause. Sometimes jaw, jaw is better than war, war if you mean what you say. It is a conundrum wrapped in an enigma.
"War is 'Hell"" - General William T. Sherman. And Eastern Europe again discovers the fact. Sad. An oversimplistic truth: "It takes TWO to tango." IMHO the conflict is not as "black and white", "good vs. evil" as the media narratives want us to believe. U.S. meddling contributed to the unfolding collective disaster for both Ukraine and Russia. I final bit of country wisdom: "chickens come home to roost."
I think it's pertinent to objectively evaluate the facts at hand.
1. The United States spent nearly five billion dollars in an effort to overthrow Viktor Yanukovych, in 2014, an elected president who just happened to be pro-russian. I presume we can all agree that this form of "power politics" doesn't lead to peace and harmony.
2. Donbass, which overwhelmingly voted for Yanukovych, decided to separate from what they perceive as inernational intereference in their elections, and the corruption in Kiev.
3. The MINSK agreement was then signed by both parties, with the goal of ending a bloody civil war.
4. Almost every independent journalist agrees that Kiev has shelled Donbass, intermittently, for nearly seven years. They refuse to aknowledge any wrong doing, and so the shellings continue, unabated. Someone has to stop it.
5. NATO claims that Russia is conducting a "false flag operation", yet whenever we are asked to provide evidence of such claims, our diplomats stage a "walk-out" which is eerily similar to the actions of the old Soviet Union.
Sending money to a corrupt regime, hell-bent on subjugating the people in Donbass, doesn't sound like a good use of money.
Can anyone imagine what would happen if postmodernists removed Trump from office by force, then pummeled Texas for seven years because they refused to bend a knee? Can anyone imagine 1.5B in arms being provided to Washington, so that they could subjugate the people of Texas.
You either believe in self determination, or you don't. Peace requires compromise. The MINSK agreement was a good start, and Kiev should have abided by that agreement.
In 1932-33, Stalin's regime orchestrated the mass murder of millions of Ukrainians, predominantly by starvation.
I share the fear and loathing of my fellow Eastern Europeans towards what the Soviet Russians did to them between 1945 ending with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. We are all rooting for the success of the Ukrainians. Slava Ukrainii!
Donbass is only asking for autonomy, for the right to deterimine their own laws, to create their own constitution and republic. I believe that denying them these rights is not dismilar to the denial of Ukrainian freedoms during the impositon of the old Soviet Union, which you and I both oppose, and the provocation that led to this current event was predominetly instigated from the west, not from Russia, so I'm afraid I see no logical connection between the thuggery of the old Soviet Union, and Donbass's claim for self determinancy.
Very well summed up. Our news media, for once, (and rather unfortunately in this instance) have united in their condemnation of Russia as the instigator of this war, but as with any conflict, the "why" is important, and our media is blatantly ignoring the provocation that led to the Russian aggression. The US wouldn't have kept quiet and swallowed it if Russia had parked a couple of missiles on the Canadian or Mexican borders, so why would we expect Russia to behave any differently?
There was also something suspect in the manner in which our media came out with what I would normally imagine to be top-secret information about our intelligentsia gathering information about a possible Russian invasion. Both the US and UK media strangely bombarded its public with news of an impending invasion about a couple of weeks prior to the event, almost as if egging Putin to suit action to word. Maybe it's my inner conspiracy theorist working overtime, but I am still not sure of the real reason why the Western Bloc countries anticipated the event with such gusto, publicized it massively, yet apparently took no steps to forestall or prepare for the event, AND the timing seems suspect as well. Is this no more than an instance of deflecting public attention away from our internal crises (inflation, supply chain, The Laptop, etc) before a crucial midterm election, which then snowballed in unanticipated ways? After all, we are no stranger to such callous tactics. Think Clinton's impending impeachment and then inexplicably Operation Desert Storm that same month, Bush's horrendous approval rating and right away troops are sent to Iraq to recover WMDs that existed solely in Bush's imagination, with of course the added bonus of shareholders such as Cheney benefiting from the surge in defence stock prices.
Something smells rotten in the state of Denmark...
The U.S. called out the impending investigation in an attempt to urge preparations for it (both inside and outside Ukraine) and to line up opposition against it. I'm not sure what else you expected/wanted the U.S. to do early this year.
Meanwhile, Operation Desert Storm happened under George (H.W.) Bush (not Clinton) and at the time W. ordered the invasion of Iraq his approval ratings were sky high; it was after 9-11 and the invasion of Afghanistan.
My mistake! It was called Desert Fox, I believe?
Sure, one reason for that veritable storm of publicity could have been to garner support among other nations, but one can gain support in other ways without letting the world and his dog know about it; Putin ended up getting advance notice and preparing for war, and his preparation seems to have been way better, which our intelligentsia should have anticipated, but didn't. Sanctions have failed, bank freezes have failed, trade embargos have failed, so clearly the support of other nations didn't have the desired effect, and actually even rebounded in some cases.
As for Bush, there have been large sections of the population who have always viewed him as an intellectual zero whose election win was somewhat suspect, and one who lived under the shadow of his father. So his decision could have stemmed from a desire to appear leader-like and prove his naysayers wrong. Another reason put forth by many is that he was obsessed with a personal vendetta against Saddam. That reason makes it even worse. For him to (ab)use the Office of the President for personal revenge, at the cost of so many lives and resources, isn't the act of a leader.
Well, all of this is hearsay and I guess there is no way to definitely know what the reasons were, but it does seem as if our presidents and our political elite are not above using the the army and the excuse of war for personal gain.
So with that said, I must admit I have plenty of doubts about the origins of this latest conflict.
To add to it, it does seem as if our attention is constantly being deflected by major news, only for it to fizzle out like a damp squib in less than a month, until the next big event. This Russia-Ukraine conflict, the monkey pox, the MAL raid, all these news items seem to have gone off the boil though they were huge at the time, and it seems weird. With each major "crisis", since air-time is finite, I have noticed that there is less and less talk about supply chains and inflation and the dreaded laptop.
So who knows ?
All of what you write may be totally true let's say and does this article give you any pause in your thinking: https://theconversation.com/yes-putin-and-russia-are-fascist-a-political-scientist-shows-how-they-meet-the-textbook-definition-179063 since it certainly does with me. If not that one how about one of these:
“Russian Will Never Want Peace: Putin has mastered the art of negotiating in bad faith” see here:
https://unherd.com/2022/03/russia-will-never-want-peace/
“What We Failed to Learn from Syria: Russian belligerence and US incompetence are familiar” see here:
https://unherd.com/2022/03/what-we-failed-to-learn-from-syria/
Thank you for your comment.
I just read those links, but I don't see how these articles are relevant to Donbass's claim for self determinancy. Please keep in mind that we started this war, in 2014, by funding the removal of Viktor Yanukovych who fairly won the election. The liberal elite in Kiev were unhappy, and the U.S. didn't like that he was pro-russian AND quite conservative, and so we spent over 5B to remove him by force.
Donbass, of course, who voted for him. refused to accept this meddling in their election because Yankukovych was their guy. He was their choice, and he won fairly, so they made the perfectly rational decision of leaving the union.
The negotiaton for their autonomy was agreed upon by all sides, with the help of Paris outlined in the MINSK protocol. This agreement ended the civil war, and gave Donbass autonomy.
For whatever reason, Kiev did not abide by this agreement. Is it because Donbas is rich in oil? Is it because they hate Russians? I don't know. But 1.5B in arms was sent to Kiev in 2019, and some of those shells (American made) are now sitting on the doorsteps of Donbass residents, and this has been ongoing for seven years. Surely, these people deserve to live without shells landing on their porch.
This is also the equilavent of Russia sending 1.5B in arms to Mexico city, and then intermittently harrassing Tijuana residents (on our border).
Now, if Russia is the one shelling Donbas, and if this is a false flag operation as NATO claims, then WE MUST SHOW EVIDENCE. When Brazil, China, Argentina, Turkery, Hungary and Russia ask for evidence, and our diplomats walk out of the room, then that is eerily similar to the actions of the old USSR. When journalists in the United States ask for evidence, and the only reply is "it's classified and you just have to believe us", then this too is eerily similar to the old USSR.
So this is the provacation that led to war.
Now in regards to the war itself, and children dying and hospitals being bombed, etc, etc. First of all, please keep in mind that the conversation is a mouth piece for the liberal elite. They curate their comment section, and the only academics who write for the conversation are liberal, and quite liberal I might add. Some of them might be described as "hard left". Despite this disclaimer, I fully agree that Russia is a more or less a totatilitarian state. But that has nothing to do with Donbass.
And there is a great deal of propaganda on both sides. For example, one photo showing Zelensky on the "front lines of war", dissimenated by our media, was actually a photo taken in 2019. And the town that was supposedly bombed by Russians, was actually leveled three days prior in an effort to garner support from the international community. In other words, they evacuated the town, bombed it, then when the Russians arrived three days later they sent out a press release claiming so-called war crimes. This type of pyschology is employed on both sides. Indeed, the pentagon has a whole department designed just to send out propaganda. And Russians have similar departments.
I don't agree with the article about Syria, because we also started that war. Obama directed the CIA to overthrow Assad, and we funded and armed the resistance. I think the operation was called Timber Sycamore, but don't quote me.
You may be 100% correct in what you write. Yes, governments are incompetent, hypocrites, lie and break promises including the USA. That said, Ukraine is not about the Donbass and who did what to whom and when any longer. It is about Putin and Putin's (or other want to be or current types like him) world view is my take. I personally don't want to live in a country that is run like Putin runs a country. I think, unfortunately, he needs to be stopped. Perhaps you don't agree with that assessment of the situation.
Yeah, I guess we have to agree to disagree. If Tijuana was being shelled by Mexico City, and Russia was funding Mexico City, I think the United States would be justified in ending the conflict. I am only placing the shoe on the other foot. So I fully support premptive strikes, when a conflict is brewing upon one's borders.
Now if Putin were to take all of Ukraine, then I would disagree with his actions. I would vehemently oppose that type of subjugation. But if he does what he says he's going to do, which is secure the liberty of Donbass, and nothing more, then I believe he is doing the right thing. I wholeheartdely support Donbass's desire for self determination.
Donbass wants liberty, not unlike the men and women who sought to separate themselves from England many years ago.
Thanks for the reply. Yes, it would be nice if everyone, everywhere could have self determination...at least to some reasonable point anyway. They may still get it one day although they may not be happy with a repressive government like Putin's. Then maybe they don't mind that type of government. I sure have no idea what the people in the Donbass are thinking. I figure they are in the thick of a proxy war at this point. The whole thing is a sad situation.
Haim's suffering, which I hope does not include injury, is chosen. The Ukrainian's suffering is unchosen (thrust upon him/her). Haim should not suffer criticism/indignation for the greater act of courage.